MOON MIND

Last night at just about the first twinkling of full-moonrise, Echo and I set out into the cold night on a long full-moon walk across the flank of the mountain, following farmer roads lit barely perceptibly by starlight. The first red of the moon gave little illumination, and but a hint of color to the shivered mirror of the Lake; then as it rose our shadows strengthened and the Lake lit up, as did the nuances of the road, the countryside and the snow capping the mountains above us, with Venus hovering over all like a crowning diamond.

From then on we walked in a rainbow of light as the moon went through its changes, from ruby through topaz to pearl and then silver, doing cosmic dramatics with the various low-riding clouds that drifted slowly along in the shape of swords and horses and other things that clouds can be.
At last though the moon was alone in the higher sky, approaching its noon. Orion was bright in the South, and I recalled how in Spain where we lived without electricity and had no clock I used to tell time at night by the location of Orion. With that a door opened, and I began to travel in other times as I walked. At the heart of bright silence on a windless night in winter the mind floats through its own cosmos, much as the moon does.